


W - like wet Wargs

by HASA_Archivist



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: General, Multi-Age
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 21:49:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3744671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HASA_Archivist/pseuds/HASA_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Alphabet of Middle-earth:<br/>Writing Cues for the "Back to Middle-earth Month 2007"<br/><br/><br/>"The Alphabet of Middle-earth" is a series of short cues to inspire you throughout B2MeM.<br/><br/>We invite you to pick up any cue, any time and to post your take as a comment for the relevant entry at the LiveJournal Community "There and Back Again".<br/><br/>Write a drabble, a drouble, a tribble, a quabble or a quibble! Write 100, 200, 300, 400 or 500 words! No matter if it's serious or silly, anything goes.<br/><br/>And here is already the next cue:<br/><br/>W - like wet Wargs</p>
            </blockquote>





	W - like wet Wargs

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the HASA Transition Team: This story was originally archived at [HASA](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Henneth_Ann%C3%BBn_Story_Archive), which closed in February 2015. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in February 2015. We posted announcements about the move, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact The HASA Transition Team using the e-mail address on the [HASA collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hasa/profile).

The river ran swift and cold with the snow melt off the White  
Mountains. It laughed its way through channels, splashing and foaming  
against rocks, rushing through the Riddermark's rare gorges.  
Green-blue-brown, with little white caps and bubbly trails, it swirled  
and flowed through sun and the shade of cliffs, collecting trinkets:  
  
Grassy drifts uprooted from wintry soil; silt that had settled on the  
riverbed; the new seeds that came to rest on the waters and would find  
a home downstream, there to grow greenly in the summer; blood...  
  
 _Blood._  
  
And bodies. Two tumbled free of each other, choking and coughing when  
the battering rocks broke the bond that held them fast. Then one clung  
to the boulders, `til cold and hurt sapped his strength and left him  
to the mercy of the river. The other, brute in strength and being,  
howled the pain of bruised ribs and bones and broken claws as the  
river swept onwards, tossed its foundling here and there, ducked that  
great bulk beneath the waters `til at last, paws struck shoals.  
  
The drenched, brown form heaved itself from the flood, water gushing  
from mouth and abused nostrils. The warg shook herself, sending up a  
spray of water, moaning and complaining a bit at the pain this caused,  
but she was strong. She had survived. And now, free of all her  
masters, `twas time to feed her own vengeful appetites...  
  
  
But the river was merciful. Perhaps it remembered a certain kinship  
with the other foundling?all waters recall the sea and the One Who  
Sounds in the Depths, and the blood this one had left in the river  
spoke of sea-salt.  
  
Thus while the warg followed along the stony bank, too fearful of the  
water's wrath for even hunger to drive her back in, the river bore the  
other safely upon its breast. When at last the glitter of the sun upon  
the water grew too bright, and the weight and chill of wet fur too  
great for even hunger to overcome, the warg gave a last, disappointed  
snarl, and made off to find a warm cave to rest in `til nightfall and  
better hunting.  
  
Only then did the current turn to wash its bounty up upon the shore.  
  
The river flowed onward, then, as ever it had, slipping down its  
channel, for 'tis not in the nature of rivers to linger. But for those  
who had ears to hear it, the waters sang softly, repeating words more  
than half-forgotten, but still flowing in the watery veins of the  
world from out of an Age long past:  
  
 _Et Eärello Endorenna utúlien. Sinomë maruvan._  
  


* * *

  
  
**Author's Notes** : This is obviously drawn from "The Two Towers"!Movieverse. The Sindarin line at the end is a part of what Elendil said, when he made landfall in Middle-earth after the _Akallabeth_.


End file.
